Theaetetus
I may observe that I have introduced Socrates, not as narrating to me, but as actually conversing with the persons whom he mentioned—these were, Theodorus the geometrician (of Cyrene), and Theaetetus. Note: 143b 'Is not learning growing wiser about that which you learn?' Note: 145d And is that different in any way from Knowledge? THEAETETUS: What? SOCRATES: Wisdom; are not men wise in that which they know? THEAETETUS: Certainly they are. SOCRATES: Then wisdom and knowledge are the same? Note: 145e Then, I think that the sciences which I learn from Theodorus—geometry, and those which you just now mentioned—are knowledge; and I would include the art of the cobbler and other craftsmen; these, each and all of, them, are knowledge. Note: 146d Then he who does not know what science or knowledge is, has no knowledge of the art or science of making shoes? Note: 147b better:—No woman, as you are probably aware, who is still able to conceive and bear, attends other women, but only those who are past bearing. Note: 149b like the midwives, I am barren, and the reproach which is often made against me, that I ask questions of others and have not the wit to answer them myself, is very just—the reason is, that the god compels me to be a midwife, but does not allow me to bring forth. Note: 150c For I have actually known some who were ready to bite me when I deprived them of a darling folly; Note: 151c knowledge is Perception. Note: 151e it is indeed the opinion of Protagoras, who has another way of expressing it. Man, he says, is the measure of all things, of the existence of things that are, and of the non-existence of things that are not:—You have read him? Note: 152a or are we to say, with Protagoras, that the wind is cold to him who is cold, and not to him who is not? Note: 152b Then appearing and perceiving coincide in the case of hot and cold, and in similar instances; for things appear, or may be supposed to be, to each one such as he perceives them? Note: 152c all things are becoming relatively to one another, which 'becoming' is by us incorrectly called being, but is really becoming, for nothing ever is, but all things are becoming. Summon all philosophers—Protagoras, Heracleitus, Empedocles, and the rest of them, one after another, and with the exception of Parmenides they will agree with you in this. Note: 152d Or that anything appears the same to you as to another man? Are you so profoundly convinced of this? Rather would it not be true that it never appears exactly the same to you, because you are never exactly the same? Note: 154a Take a look round, then, and see that none of the uninitiated are listening. Now by the uninitiated I mean the people who believe in nothing but what they can grasp in their hands, and who will not allow that action or generation or anything invisible can have real existence. Note: 155e an objection which may be raised about dreams and diseases, in particular about madness, and the various illusions of hearing and sight, Note: 158a ask:—How can you determine whether at this moment we are sleeping, and all our thoughts are a dream; or whether we are awake, and talking to one another in the waking state? Note: 158b And may not the same be said of madness and other disorders? the difference is only that the times are not equal. THEAETETUS: Certainly. SOCRATES: And is truth or falsehood to be determined by duration of time? Note: 158d example:—There is Socrates in health, and Socrates sick—Are they like or unlike? Note: 159b so that whether a person says that a thing is or becomes, he must say that it is or becomes to or of or in relation to something else; but he must not say or allow any one else to say that anything is or becomes absolutely:—such is our conclusion. Note: 160b For if truth is only sensation, and no man can discern another's feelings better than he, or has any superior right to determine whether his opinion is true or false, but each, as we have several times repeated, is to himself the sole judge, and everything that he judges is true and right, why, my friend, should Protagoras be preferred to the place of wisdom and instruction, and deserve to be well paid, and we poor ignoramuses have to go to him, if each one is the measure of his own wisdom? Note: 161d whether a man who has learned, and remembers, can fail to know? Note: 163d this:—Can a man know and also not know that which he knows? Note: 165b whatever appears to a state to be just and fair, so long as it is regarded as such, is just and fair to it; but the teacher of wisdom causes the good to take the place of the evil, both in appearance and in reality. And in like manner the Sophist who is able to train his pupils in this spirit is a wise man, and deserves to be well paid by them. Note: 167c although he admitted that there was a better and worse, and that in respect of this, some who as he said were the wise excelled others. Note: 169d For tell me, Theodorus, do you suppose that you yourself, or any other follower of Protagoras, would contend that no one deems another ignorant or mistaken in his opinion? Note: 170c And the best of the joke is, that he acknowledges the truth of their opinion who believe his own opinion to be false; for he admits that the opinions of all men are true. Note: 171a He is a servant, and is continually disputing about a fellow-servant before his master, who is seated, and has the cause in his hands; the trial is never about some indifferent matter, but always concerns himself; and often the race is for his life. The consequence has been, that he has become keen and shrewd; he has learned how to flatter his master in word and indulge him in deed; but his soul is small and unrighteous. Note: 173a the contemplation of justice and injustice in their own nature and in their difference from one another and from all other things; Note: 175c not merely in order that a man may seem to be Good, which is the reason given by the world, and in my judgment is only a repetition of an old wives' fable. Whereas, the truth is that God is never in any way unrighteous—he is perfect righteousness; and he of us who is the most righteous is most like him. Note: 176c the penalty is, that they lead a life answering to the pattern which they are growing like. Note: 177a If you ask any of them a question, he will produce, as from a quiver, sayings brief and dark, and shoot them at you; Note: 180a tell me, then, when a thing changes from one Place to another, or goes round in the same place, is not that what is called motion? Note: 181c whether all things according to them have the two kinds of motion, and are changed as well as move in place, or is one thing moved in both ways, and another in one only? Note: 181d Then Knowledge does not consist in Impressions of sense, but in reasoning about them; Note: 186d Then perception, Theaetetus, can never be the same as knowledge or science? Note: 186e knowledge is true Opinion: Note: 187b All things and everything are either known or not known. I leave out of view the intermediate conceptions of learning and forgetting, because they have nothing to do with our present question. THEAETETUS: There can be no doubt, Socrates, if you exclude these, that there is no other alternative but knowing or not knowing a thing. Note: 188a Where, then, is false opinion? Note: 188c no one can think that which is not, Note: 189b May we not suppose that false opinion or thought is a sort of heterodoxy; a person may make an exchange in his mind, and say that one real object is another real object. Note: 189c It is possible then upon your view for the mind to conceive of one thing as another? Note: 189d I mean the conversation which the soul holds with herself in considering of anything. Note: 190a But do you ever remember saying to yourself that the noble is certainly base, or the unjust just; Note: 190b he who maintains that false opinion is heterodoxy is talking nonsense; Note: 190d you may learn a thing which at one time you did not know? Note: 191c I would have you imagine, then, that there exists in the mind of man a block of wax, Note: 191d we remember and know what is imprinted as long as the image lasts; Note: 191d Socrates can recognize Theodorus and Theaetetus, but he sees neither of them, nor does he perceive them in any other way; he cannot then by any possibility imagine in his own mind that Theaetetus is Theodorus. Note: 193a I, knowing one of you and not knowing the other, and perceiving neither, can never think him whom I know to be him whom I do not know. Note: 193a In the third case, not knowing and not perceiving either of you, I cannot think that one of you whom I do not know is the other whom I do not know. Note: 193b The only possibility of erroneous opinion is, when knowing you and Theodorus, and having on the waxen block the impression of both of you given as by a seal, but seeing you imperfectly and at a distance, I try to assign the right impression of Memory to the right visual impression, and to fit this into its own print: Note: 193c the wax in the soul of any one is deep and abundant, and smooth and perfectly tempered, then the impressions which pass through the senses and sink into the heart of the soul, as Homer says in a parable, meaning to indicate the likeness of the soul to wax (Kerh Kerhos); these, I say, being pure and clear, and having a sufficient depth of wax, are also lasting, and minds, such as these, easily learn and easily retain, and are not liable to confusion, but have true thoughts, Note: 194d mind—the soft are good at learning, but apt to forget; and the hard are the reverse; the shaggy and rugged and gritty, or those who have an admixture of earth or dung in their composition, have the impressions indistinct, as also the hard, for there is no depth in them; and the soft too are indistinct, for their impressions are easily confused and effaced. Note: 195a false opinion arises neither in the comparison of Perceptions with one another nor yet in Thought, but in union of thought and perception? Note: 195d Exactly; and I want you to consider whether this does not imply that the twelve in the waxen block are supposed to be eleven? Note: 196b Then false opinion cannot be explained as a confusion of thought and sense, Note: 196c We may suppose that the birds are kinds of knowledge, and that when we were children, this receptacle was empty; Note: 197e And when transmitting them he may be said to teach them, and when receiving to learn them, and when receiving to learn them, and when having them in possession in the aforesaid aviary he may be said to know them. Note: 198b when a man has learned and known something long ago, he may resume and get hold of the knowledge which he has long possessed, but has not at hand in his mind. Note: 198d he who takes ignorance will have a false opinion—am I right? Note: 200a He will think that his opinion is true, and he will fancy that he knows the things about which he has been deceived? Note: 200a true Opinion, combined with Reason, was knowledge, Note: 201d he who cannot give and receive a reason for a thing, has no knowledge of that thing; Note: 202c letters or simple elements as a class are much more certainly known than the syllables, and much more indispensable to a perfect knowledge of any subject; Note: 206b perhaps he only intended to say, that when a person was asked what was the nature of anything, he should be able to answer his questioner by giving the elements of the thing. Note: 207a There is, further, the popular notion of telling the mark or sign of difference which distinguishes the thing in question from all others.